Caught up in the moment, it could easily have been 1999 again: the Monte Carlo Rally where Ford and Colin McRae made a splash with the all-new Focus WRC.
But wake up out of the daze, and quickly you realize that Kalle Rovanperä, Sami Pajari and Josh McErlean weren’t even born then, let alone old enough to be driving Rally1 cars.
Last weekend, it was still 2025. But Dave Taylor didn’t need to wake up. He really was bringing 1999 back to life, and living this unbelievable dream with his utterly unique car.
Dave is what we’d call a ‘bobblehatter’ in the UK. Loose translation: a die-hard rally fan. With memories of watching the 1985 RAC up in Kielder Forest – local to his home in Newcastle – the rally bug bit him hard and has taken him to countless national, and world championship, events over the years.
Given the era he grew up in, it’s no surprise Colin McRae and Richard Burns quickly became heroes of his. McRae more so, but Dave has built tribute cars for both of them!
It’s his latest effort, a replica of McRae’s ’99 Focus, that’s really garnered attention though. So much so that it was front and center of M-Sport’s service area in Gap throughout the opening round of the World Rally Championship.
Dave has poured his heart into creating a replica of the 1999 Ford Focus WRC driven by McRae
The idea was initially to commemorate his rallying hero McRae, but quickly the project became a tribute to another hero too.
“I’ve taken it to another level with this one. It’s a full-blown replica, inside and outside,” Dave explains.
“I bought this as a standard ST170 Focus with the intention of doing it up with my dad, like the last two. Unfortunately, my dad wasn’t well at all, so during the build, I had to put it on hold for about two years.
“My mom had dementia and my dad was very poorly. Me and my dad used to go up and we’d spend like 20 minutes, half an hour [working on the car], because that’s all he could manage. He was sitting down and that. We didn’t really get much progress done on it and so we had to come to a halt because we had to look after them.
“Unfortunately, dad passed away so he never actually saw it finished. Then 10 weeks after that, my mom passed away so it was literally put on hold.
“I was left an envelope from my dad who put some money in and left a note that said: ‘Get the Focus finished and never sell it’. So that’s one of the reasons why I can’t sell it, and I won’t sell it.
“That’s one of the reasons why I’ve really pushed the envelope with this one. It’s got so much detail inside and it’s got so much extra stuff that I might not have put in. So I’ve gone above and beyond really for two of my heroes – not just Colin, for my dad as well.”
What Dave has created goes beyond a passion project. And the details really are impressive – this isn’t a tasteless hash-job but a genuinely accurate replica, featuring period-correct details like the very same rear wing that adorned the rally car.
M-Sport driver Munster tries Dave's Focus for size
But it’s the human element that makes this story so compelling. Dave is currently suffering from cancer, and always dreamed of one day making it to the Monte Carlo Rally. So along with his good friend Tony Halliday, they thought ‘why not?’
However no trip to the Monte would be complete without Dave’s 1999-liveried Focus replica, so a crazy idea was born. They’d drive the 1000-mile journey from South Shields to Gap (effectively the entire length of both England and France) in a 23-year-old car.
“I set the ball rolling, started looking around and doing extra bits with the car,” Dave recalls.
“I think in about September time I actually messaged Colin [Clark] and I was shocked to get a voice note back from him for a good couple of minutes telling us about the rallying, advising to book early in Gap and stuff like that.
“So that for me was very, very rare to get somebody like Colin to message me back, like a personal message saying this is how I would do it. I’ve still got that message on my phone, it’s a bit surreal to be fair.
“And it basically went from there.”
Little did Dave know that his journey was about to inspire the entire WRC service park.
He had messaged M-Sport team principal Rich Millener beforehand to let him know about what he was doing, but simply wasn’t prepared for the reception he got.
The replica Focus had its pride of place outside M-Sport's service area last weekend
“I was expecting just to be in the service park at some point or somewhere,” he says, “not the actual spot that I got [right outside M-Sport], I still think it’s very surreal for me.
“Because the moment I pulled up in that service park on the Tuesday morning, I saw Kieran and Gary, the head mechanics of M-Sport and I said: ‘Can I just park it there?’ Rich Millener knew I was going but Rich is a busy man and he can’t always get back in touch with you through messages and stuff. I didn’t hear anything, but I knew it wouldn’t be a problem.
“So when I arrived at the service park, I just parked it where it was on the corner where everybody’s seen it, opposite M-Sport. Then, obviously, I got talking to Kieran and Gary and they said: ‘It’s just fantastic. You can just be our guest for the rest of the week’.
“And I was like, pardon? ‘Hospitality as our guest, just tell them you’re here with us’. This doesn’t happen to people like me. I’m just a rally fan, and I know I love M-Sport, and I know I love Colin McRae, but it doesn’t really happen to people like me, surely?
“And it just got better and better and better and better, and I’m just trying to pinch myself and come back into the real world.”
The experience didn’t end there. The Focus made an impression on the event organizers, too.
Everyone wanted a bit of Dave and his Focus
“There were some special moments in the service park,” Dave continues. “Obviously, I was letting people sit in it and the young kids were having photographs by their parents and even parents, grown men and women, were sitting in it and loving it.
“For me that was special. I think a lot of them went back in decades to revisit a moment where Colin was actually there. So that again was special. I even got asked to take the car down to the check-out in the service park, you know where the timing zone was.
“They just loved it, and it was just… it was loved. And standing back, like next to the M-Sport tent and watching hundreds of people look at your car and just every one of them said it was magnifique. And it was just… it was, for me, it was very special. Quite emotional to be fair.
“And we got to drive the shakedown stage on the Wednesday morning!” he adds. “Very slowly I might add, but I actually got permission off ACM [Automobile Club de Monaco] to do it.
“I was like, my God, this is just getting better. I’ve only been here a day. Can it get any better than this? Is this actually happening?”
Yet it did get better, as the great and the good of the WRC all got the Sharpie out and signed Dave’s car.
So the Focus arrived back home in the north-east of England proudly displaying the signatures of Sébastien Ogier, Kalle Rovanperä, Elfyn Evans, Takamoto Katsuta, Sami Pajari, Jari-Matti Latvala, Juha Kankkunen, Cyril Abiteboul, Rich Millener, Grégoire Munster, Josh McErlean and so many more – even the DirtFish media team!
Ogier was one of several world rallying stars to sign the Focus
“For the people who actually signed it, the buzz I got, I mean I can’t…” Dave pauses, struggling to find the appropriate words.
“We’re just two normal lads who love their rallying, do you know what I mean?
“Down in Monaco on Thursday – a place you never think you’ll get to go to – I was having a conversation with Kiri Bloore who told me to go and see a guy called Miguel [Fonesca, WRC Promoter accreditation manager]. And he went around and sent an email to all the drivers and obviously the team bosses. So that’s how I got the signatures.
“It was total chance, like I was just in the right place at the right time with the right people who set us up. It was just… that was unreal.”
That became a theme of Dave’s week – which may not be a total coincidence.
“Every time I moved somewhere, I don’t know what it was, but I had my dad’s watch on, I had my dad’s picture in my wallet,” he says.
“And I just used to say: ‘Get us there and back, just get the car there and back safe and sound’, and that’s exactly what happened. But all week, my timings for catching people were just perfect.
“I couldn’t have done it better if I’d tried. Like when we met you [DirtFish] going down towards the car park, it was just… you were there and we were there. So then we had 10 minutes with you and you signed the car and stuff. It was like that constantly through the whole week.”
We got the chance to meet Dave and look around his Focus in a car park in Monaco
Somebody was definitely watching over him. And therein lies the irony in Dave’s quest.
He’s done it for his two biggest heroes, but he’s too humble to realize that he’s actually a hero himself.
Undoubtedly he’s been dealt a difficult hand in life, but there’s not an ounce of complaint nor a moment of self pity. In the face of adversity, Dave just gets on with it.
The memories he made last weekend will live long in the memory, but if there’s to be one takeaway from his incredible trip: let it be this.
Dave’s approach of when the going gets tough, the tough get going is rather reminiscent of the hero his incredible car is in homage to, don’t you think?
